Alabama, 4 other states failed to properly register death penalty drug with DEA

View full sizeAlabama's lethal injection chamber at Holman Correctional Facility in Atmore, Ala., is pictured in this Oct. 7, 2002 file photo. E-mails from the DEA show five states, including Alabama, failed to register shipments of a drug used in administering the death penalty. (AP/Dave Martin)

ATLANTA — Emails from the Drug Enforcement Administration show that some of the states scrambling to import a lethal injection sedative in scarce supply failed to properly register the shipments with the agency.

A DEA email sent in November says the agency was only notified twice that sodium thiopental had been imported.

The DEA took Georgia's stockpile of the drug in March after defense attorneys questioned whether the state properly registered with the agency before importing it from London. The DEA has since taken stockpiles from Alabama, Kentucky, South Carolina and Tennessee.

The DEA requires states to register with the agency before importing a controlled substance.

The DEA emails were obtained Wednesday by the ACLU of Northern California.